Friday, November 1, 2013

Recently, I started a "Daily Deals" tab in the menu. In all honestly, I planned to keep it frequently updated. Hasn't happened! Today it has been uploaded with all new items. This weekend we are featuring a fantastic sale on Flannel Swaddling Blankets by Swaddle Designs. Here are a few pics of some of the great blankets for sale:

Morning Sky Elephants and Chickies Swaddling Blanket

Bright Pink Dots Organic Blanket

Kiwi Paisleys Blanket

All the blankets measure 44" x 44" making them perfect for swaddling your precious little one. They also make great nursing covers for moms and great sun covers for baby carriers. I'm sure you can think of a lot more uses for these fabulous blankets! They are a great gift to have on hand for a baby shower, christmas, or any occasion.

The sale price is only listed on the Daily Deals page (not on the brand name or swaddling blankets pages). You MUST purchase off the Daily Deals page to get the sale price. Here is a link to the Daily Deals Page .

Prices are only good through this weekend until Sunday night at midnight.

Sunday, September 22, 2013

September is Childhood Cancer Awareness month and The Polka Dot Store will donate 10% of our sales to American Cancer Society. As many of you may already know, my oldest child was diagnosed with T-cell ALL (leukemia) when he was 16 years old. I am happy to say he is a healthy happy 30 year old man now. He has a great job and owns is own home. So, as you can probably guess, Childhood Cancer Awareness is very "near and dear" to my heart. When my son was diagnosed and going through treatment, you didn't hear much about childhood cancer and I am so thankful people are finally aware of this very traumatic time for a child and his/her family. The survival rates have increased which is wonderful but the treatment itself is very hard on a child. Seeing what these precious children endure will really touch your heart but, their attitudes and bravery will amaze you. There are many organizations that help the patient and their families during treatment. I thought you might like to know about a few that were/are very special to me and my family.

The American Cancer Society paid for all our stays at the Ronald McDonald House on Houston Mill Road in Atlanta. We were always met with a compassionate smile when we arrived and they did everything possible to make our stay as comfortable as possible. Since my son was treated at Egleston Childrens Hospital, now know as Childrens Healthcare of Atlanta Egleston, this location was very close and convenient. I can't say enough about the loving care my son received from the staff of doctors, nurses, and support staff at Egleston. They were the best. Last year during this time The Polka Dot Store donated to Cure. Cure funds extensive research for childhood cancer. At the time of my son's illness, they also provided supper one night a week to the families and patients of children being treatment on the cancer floor in the hospital. The volunteers were warm and welcoming to families who were going through such a stressful and unsure time.

Another great cause is the Make-A-Wish Foundation. They granted my son's wish to travel to New York City to meet a celebrity chef and see a taping of his show. They sent the whole family and we were treated like royalty. It was an experience and memory we will never forget.

I am so proud that the town I live in acknowledges Childhood Cancer Awareness month. Each year they hold a gold ribbon fundraiser for childhood cancer research by selling gold bows that are attached to the benches and trees on our downtown streets.

This picture was found in a great article that can be found here. I went downtown myself and took several photos. They are below.

Monday, August 19, 2013

On the weekends I try to put work aside and do some creative thinking. I've been wanting to do some more applique and decided to applique a name on a baby gown. The font is called Julia and I found it here .

So, what do you think?

My next project was one my daughter asked me to do. My grandson is about to turn two and is potty training. The disposable pull-ups are great but expensive. Plus, Max thinks he is a really big boy when he wears big boy underwear. Katy saw something somewhere - probably Pinterest- where a mom sewed a panel of PUL fabric over the center panel on the underwear. The PUL helps keep any accidents from getting on clothes, etc. PUL stands for polyester/polyurethane laminate. According to the Fabric.com, polyurethane is laminated to a 70
denier interlock fabric. PUL has the following characteristics: washable, waterproof, breathable, stretches, hypoallergenic, made in the U.S.A., and is solvent laminated.

I'll let you know if my daughter likes them and if they work well for her son.

Another ongoing project at our house is our chickens. We have one rooster, Ricky, and six hens. They are quite the characters. Last week the hens started laying eggs. We have gotten almost two dozen eggs so far. The picture below is some of the first eggs that were laid.

We have three varieties of hens so we have different size eggs. The chickens follow me everywhere! I was loading the car today and left the drivers door open. When I went to get in the car, this is what I found!

My life is definitely interesting! It's Monday and so time to get back to work. I hope all of you have a great week. Please stop in and do some shopping at The Polka Dot Store where "Blessings Happen Every Day".

Friday, August 2, 2013

Wow, I can't believe it has been almost a month since my last blog post. This week as I was catching up on orders, I started thinking about what my customers are ordering for gifts. When my youngest was born and someone would bring her a baby gift, my two toddlers would look anxiously to see if there was also a gift for them. I've noticed quite a few of my customers also send personalized backpacks to the sibling along with a gift for the baby. Here is a picture of one of the combinations ordered this week.

Cute isn't it? The hooded towel on the left is the Pink Alligator Everykid Towel by 3 Marthas and the backpack on the right is Dandy Pandy from Oak Patch Gifts. I would love to help you with your next gift purchase.

Friday, July 5, 2013

If you have been on the website or on the Facebook Page, then you know I am
probably not at home. In fact, I am at my daughter's house helping
her sell her house, move, have surgery, help with her 22 month old
(a.k.a. playing with my grandson), and recover all while going
through a divorce. During all the hassles and getting sick after her
surgery we still managed to have one day of FUN! A friend of ours,
Jennifer, over at Twists of Life Unique Thrift, has been doing some fabulous work with chalk paint and
repurposed furniture. Plus, she gives lessons! My daughter and I
decided to take a lesson before things got really crazy with the
move. We fell in love with it.

For some reason, it didn't occur to me
to take before pictures of the pieces we worked on or an after
picture of the piece I worked on. Jennifer “loaned” me an antique
desk chair to work on and she had me paint it in Barnyard Red. The
color was gorgeous and I fell in love with it. Here is a picture of
the chair and base before it was distressed:

Isn't it a fabulous color?

My daughter inherited my bedroom set
from when I was a little girl. She decided to take the night stand to
work on. For those of you who are not as old as I am, this is a white
french provincial bedroom set by Bassett. You will just have to
imagine it in white since I neglected to take a before pic. Here is
the back of the piece after two coats of paint:

The color is Burlap and the edges were
distressed. Can I just say, “Distressing is fun!”. Here is a pic
of the finished piece.

She did a great job! After she
recovers from all that has been going on, she plans to paint the
dresser, desk, head and foot board that go with the set. My mind has
been working overtime on thinking about things I can use chalk paint
on and distress. By the way, Jennifer sells the paint in her shop.

Not only is Twists of Life Unique
Thrift a great thrift shop but they also do an auction every
Wednesday night. On Wednesday mornings, Jennifer posts pictures of
items being auctioned that night. Check out the Facebook page for
Blue Chicken Auction! If you are in the Dallas, Georgia area, be sure
to visit the store and her auctions. Thank you Jennifer for teaching
us such a fun thing to do!

You can find Twists of Life Unique Thrift at 503 Memorial Dr., Dallas, GA. Check out her store Facebook Page here and her auction Facebook Page here.

Saturday, June 8, 2013

The world of applique designs has really exploded in the last year or so. There are tons of great new digitizers coming up with super cute designs and I can't wait to start stitching some out for you. I've recently purchased designs from Applique Cafe and Applique Corner . I would love to know what you like about applique and what you would like to see them stitched on. I'm so excited about this and will post pictures when I get some of them stitched out. In the meantime, I'll post a picture of "fred" bringing his new baby gossling to the bird feeder for the first time. Cute!

There are now over 500 Likes our Facebook Page so be on the look out for another give away soon! Have you shared our Facebook Page? Please like and share our page. The more "likes" we have, the larger the give away will be.The Polka Dot Store Facebook Page

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Hi Everyone! I hope you are having a great Memorial Day weekend. We are busy around our house sprucing up for a bridal shower I am hosting next weekend. The Polka Dot Store is having a great Birthday Give Away this weekend on Facebook. It runs through Monday at midnight EST. Like, comment, and share the post for a chance to win a great bag of goodies!

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Wow, where have the last few months gone? Life here in south Georgia has been crazy busy. Between family and working on the website, I feel like I've hardly had time to do anything else. That said, I want to show you pictures of some things I have been able to squeeze in time monogram for friends and family. The first picture shows some of the very popular sun hats that are the craze right now.

A friend of mine is having a new grandbaby and they are not telling the name until after the little one arrives. I really wanted to try out a new design I purchased and this is how it turned out.

Another thing that is really popular right now are T-Shirt Pockets. I experimented on some t-shirts for myself and they turned out kind of cute!

The orange and white shirt pockets use Empire font. On the tan shirt pocket the Victor font was stitched on the pocket and Octagonal font was used on the coral shirt. Pretty good for my first attempts, don't you think?

Lastly, I needed new pillows for my sofa..........................I wanted things to look good for a meeting I was having at my house, so I made some out of burlap.

Well, that is what I have been up to lately. Now I need to get back to working on orders. New items have been added to the website so please go on over to The Polka Dot Store and pick out something adorable!

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

With it being spring break time here in the south, that means....................the grandchildren are coming for a visit. They were out for spring break on different weeks so we were lucky enough to have the 18 month old for two weeks. Back several months ago I decided I wanted to move the 11 year old into a different room and redo it for him. So I have been collecting everything for the room and then started working on it. My husband and daughter helped me put the finishing touches on the room last week so it would be ready for Logan when he arrived. I apologize in advance for the lousy lighting in the pictures!This is a picture of the finished room:

The drapes are actually shower curtains that I found online at West Elm . They are exactly what I was looking for. Because they are only 72 inches tall, hanging them with rope was the perfect solution. I found the light tan bed skirts online at Overstock.com . Because the bed in the center has drawers underneath the mattress, there was no need to skirt that bed. I appliqued Logan's pillowcase with his name in El Paso Font. He loved it.

In this picture you can see the copper rods my husband made out of copper pipe that he found at Lowe's. He and my son had to cut the pipe and piece it together to get the length I needed. This is a large set of windows and I couldn't find much less afford custom made rods to fit. I used the buttonholes in the shower curtains to run the rope through and hang on the rod. Pretty cute, right? On the wall you can see the "turners" that we attached with the same type rope we used on the drapes. I found the "turners" at Scott's Antique Market in Atlanta. Cool, right?

My daughter and I went shopping while she was here and we found this cool rope lamp at T.J. Max. Honestly, I can't remember where we found the long leg bird but I had to purchase it. We have a bird that looks just like it on our pond.

Lastly, I just had to include my curious cat, Toby, checking out the room redo and making sure he can still see the birds on the feeders below.

I hope you enjoyed this tour of the room redo. It is finally finished and I love it.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Wow, sorry it has been so long since I last posted. Things have really been busy here at Granny's Attic and The Polka Dot Store.com. Most of the merchandise ordered at Gift Market in January has arrived. Orders have been great. Thank you new customers and lots of thanks to returning customers. Ya'll are the best!Here is a display of the new Everykid Towels by 3 Marthas:

I really like the new designs! Left to right - Baby Birdie, Blue Froggie Friend, Pink Froggie Friend, New Truck, Pink Whale Waves, Blue Whale Waves, Pink Gingham Elephant, Pink Colorful Crab, and the new Football Design.3 Marthas has started offering bloomers for little girls and of course, I want to offer them to you! Below is an example of some of the bloomers:

Are they adorable?

This afternoon I had the pleasure of attending a baby shower for a dear friend's daughter. It was so much fun. I had the best time selecting what I wanted to give the mother-to-be. Below is a picture of the gift before I wrapped it.

I custom made the blanket to include with the gift. It is made with swiss flannel fabric, lined with china silk, edge hemstitched with tatting added, and a beautiful cross embroidery. The rest of the gift package included the Cross Bubble by Mud Pie, Cross Keepsake Box by Mud Pie, Cross Bib and Burp Cloth by Granny's Attic, Boy Diaper Cover by Granny's Attic, Blessings Snuggler by Bearington Baby, and Cross Artwork by Mud Pie.

Like I said, this past month has been busy and fun. Please visit The Polka Dot Store where Blessing Happen Every Day.

Thursday, January 31, 2013

Recently, a customer emailed saying she needed an order processed quickly because she wanted to use it for a birthday party. I thought, "What a great idea!". She was planning to use the personalized bib on a stuffed bear as the centerpiece on the party table. Immediately, ideas started popping into my brain and I started visualizing this as the centerpiece at a baby shower or the main part of a gift basket. Fun! The next time I had an order for a personalized bib, I put it on a bear and took a picture to show you. Below, you will see our Pink Minky Bib by Mud Pie on our Bliss Bear by Melissa & Doug.

Adorable! The bib is stitched in Font 23 in hot pink thread. I think Mrs. Bear looks stunning in her personalized bib and is ready for any occasion.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

As many of you know, I purchased a new 6 needle embroidery machine back in the fall. Since then I have been "collecting" different frames for the machine. As with most things, the right accessories produce the best results. While my grandson -yes, I said grandson. I may be older in age but not in spirit- was here a few weeks ago, he was playing with inventory as I was trying to count inventory. He loved pulling the legwarmers out of the basket.

As I was putting them back in the basket, Max and I decided he needed a pair of the Fire Truck Leg Warmers by BabyLegs and it would look cute to try to stitch his name on them. Here is the result:

I think they look really cute so this option will be added to the website soon! Let me know what you think! Adorable leg warmers and socks can be found here